The Causes of Religion, Superstitions and Paranormal Beliefs

Religious beliefs with foundation in 'faith', superstitions and paranormal beliefs all share in common a certain irrational and illogical character. What causes such beliefs?

1. The Institutionalisation of Irrationality
2. Religion as a Psychological Byproduct
3. Myths, Dogma and Ritual: Leftovers from a Pre-Literate Humanity
4. Religion as a Biological Neuronal Dysfunction
5. Experiencing God
6. Subconscious Childhood Fantasies
7. The Fear of Death
8. The Relation of Desperate Times to New Religious Experiments Including Conversion, Superstitions and Lucky Charms
9. Conclusions

The Institutionalisation of Irrationality

1. Bottom-Up Grassroots Movements: Individuals come to hold paranormal beliefs, for whatever reasons (discussed on this page), and sometimes these become popular beliefs held by many. In these cases, a bottom-up transformation effects the religions of the era. This also happens when new religions impose themselves upon a populace: they combine folk, paranormal beliefs with the terminology of the new religion. Many scientific discoveries have affected religion in this way: The orthodox fought against astronomers who said that the Earth was flat, but eventually the beliefs of the masses changed until finally, the official doctrine of the Church changed. Many similar battles have occurred.

2. Top-Down Entropy: As religion develops over time its tenets and beliefs filter down to the populace. Particular pieces of a religious paradigm can become so mainstream that their origins in the particular religion are forgotten. When the religion changes, or is superceded, odd practices still remain behind. "Superstitions are religious forms surviving the loss of ideas" (Levi, 1860). In this way, for example, people still say "bless you" when others sneeze, even though the majority no longer believe that demons are entering and leaving the body.

The second route is a result of the changes within already-established religions. This page is about the first route: How do we come to believe in the odd things that religions are then purpoted to explain? What is it in our nature that fires our imaginations, and consistently allows people to believe in ridiculous, unfounded and surprising things? This page examines the psychological and biological factors that incline some people towards supernatural beliefs.

Religion as a Psychological Byproduct

Many psychologists, scientists and researchers have come to the conclusion that religion is a by-product of otherwise-normal processes in the brain. One major cause of this, say experts, is the tendency for us to see "agency" in the complicated movements of (unconscious) natural events:

“The ethologist Robert Hinde, in Why Gods Persis, and the anthropologists Pascal Boyer, in Religion Explained, and Scott Atran, in In Gods We Trust, have independently promoted the general idea of religion as a by-product of normal psychological dispositions. [...] The psychologist Paul Bloom, another advocate of the 'religion is a by-product' view, points out that children have a natural tendency towards a dualistic theory of mind. Religion, for him, is a by-product of such instinctive dualism. We humans, he suggest, and especially children, are natural born dualists. [...] Other by-product explanations of religion have been proposed by Hinde, Shermer, Boyer, Atran, Bloom, Dennett, Keleman and others.”

"The God Delusion" by Prof. Richard Dawkins, p177, 179, 184

Dualism is the simplistic idea that things have physical bodies and seperate intentions. It is easy to see how we, as a species, found it useful to develop such an instinctive view. Prof. Richard Dawkins is the foremost expert in evolution. He explains that various components of our normal working brain can result in beliefs that are religious and irrational in nature, due to the scientifically inaccurate way that we model the world. The 'hyperactive agent detection device' is the clumsy name given to the clumsy way in which we tend to personify complex movements (giving them intentions):

“We are biologically programmed to impute intentions to entities whose behaviour matters to us. [...] Children, and primitive peoples, impute intentions to the weather, to waves and currents, to falling rocks. All of us are prone to do the same thing with machines, especially when they let us down. Many will remember with affection the day Basil Fawlty's car broke down during his vital mission to save Gourmet Night from disaster. He gave it fair warning, counted to three, then got out of the car, seized a tree branch and thrashed it to within an inch of its life. [...] Justin Barett coined the acronym HADD, for hyperactive agent detection device.”

"The God Delusion" by Prof. Richard Dawkins, p183

As religion developed out of these instincts in our history, now, our present science disconfirms our projections of intent on to inanimate objects. But frequently we still believe in the religions that have developed out of these misdirected ideas. The attribution of natural events to 'magical' and 'spiritual' causes is frequently an easier way to understand than to study the phenomena scientifically. It is an easy way out of existential difficulties. Paul Kurtz explains that this psychology is subconscious:

“I surely do not wish to suggest that conscious deception is the primary explanation for all or even most paranormal beliefs. Rather, it is self-deception that accounts for so much credulity. There is a powerful willingness in all too many people to believe in the unbelievable in spite of a lack of evidence or even evidence to the contrary. This propensity was due in part to what I have called the transcendental temptation, the tendency to resort to magical thinking, the attribution of occult causes for natural phenomena. The best antidote for this, I submit, is critical thinking.”

Paul Kurtz, Skeptical Inquirer (2006)₁

Myths, Dogma and Ritual: Leftovers from a Pre-Literate Humanity

I now take some text and quotes from my own "Some People Need Dogma and Ritual" by Vexen Crabtree (2002). Monic Furlong, in her book on the Church of England (2000) explains how the reformation, that reformed Christianity and placed a heavy emphasis on text, caused a backlack because Human nature likes more:

“Part of our human consciousness is pre-literate, both historically and in our personal childhood experience, and the whole of our experience cannot necessarily be captured by words. It may be important to lay wordless experiences alongside the wordy ones, as in music, colour, form, movement and smell.”

"The C of E: The State It's In" by Monica Furlong, p48

“This is recognition that our need for such things is based not on God-given instinct, but a subconscious biologically-based leftover from out preliterate days, and our preliterate youth. When symbols, as in early religion, were much more powerful and imposing because we had no words. Symbolism and ritual form part of our development, and part of our needs, in life. Monica may not have meant to highlight such a fundamental way that atheists look on religion: as a misguided answer to some biological impulse. Science and humanism don't satisfy this impulse for some people, because of the lack of symbolism and ritual.”

"Some People Need Dogma and Ritual" by Vexen Crabtree (2002)

“Myths can be debased and uprooted. All that happens is that modern myths and rituals replace the traditional ones, for myths and archetypes are an inherent part of the human psyche. Human beings appear to need a religious underpinning both to their personal and to their social lives. At the personal level, human beings need a mythology within which to frame their identities and the meaning of their lives. At the social level, some ideology is needed to give people a vision of their history, their present place in the world and their future direction, to act as a focal point of unity, an agreed framework for public policy and a justification for the public rituals that affirm social cohesion. Where formal religion no longer provides this underpinning, various alternatives have evolved. At the social level, 'pseudo-religions' such as Marxism and nationalism have been successful partly because they do provide an alternative picture - a myth of history and a direction for the future.”

"The Phenomenon Of Religion" by M. Momen [Book Review], p296

We have seen how religious beliefs can frequently derive from the inacurate ways in which we have evolved to see the world and from otherwise-normal psychological mechanisms misleading us into supernatural and irrational beliefs. Our instincts to look out for what objects are 'doing' confuses us into various parascientific beliefs. However not all religion is best explained as side-effects of normal psychology. Religious beliefs and actions are sometimes the results of abnormal psychology, as the following sections will show.

Religion as a Biological Neuronal Dysfunction

There is much evidence in history that the more profound religious insights occur alongside mental dysfunction. The psychologist William James, in his survey of religious experience, comments that there are a massive proportion of prominent religious people in history that have shown signs of now-recognized long-term neurological complaints.

“Religious geniuses have often shown symptoms of nervous instability. Even more perhaps than other kinds of genius, religious leaders have been subject to abnormal psychical visitations. [...] They have led a discordant inner life, and had melancholy during a part of their career. They have [...] been liable to obsessions and fixed ideas; and frequently they have fallen into trances, heard voices, seen visions, and presented all sorts of peculiarities which are ordinarily classed as pathological. Often [...] these pathological features in their career have helped to give them their religious authority and influence.”

"The Varieties of Religious Experience" by William James [Book info / quotes], p29

The average believer does not suffer from such severe cataclysms, however, and merely beliefs in the irrational results of others' experiences that have become codified as part of a religion. In normal believers, it may be a long-term background dysfunction of the prefrontal cortex that leads to illogical beliefs:

“People with greater paranormal beliefs showed lower levels of executive function. Particularly, they had less impulse control and greater disorganization, independent of age, sex, or level of education. In contrast, people with greater moral attitudes showed greater executive functioning in all areas measured (motivation, impulse control, empathy, planning, and organization). These findings support studies suggesting that superstitious thinking involves some degree of dysfunction in the prefrontal cortex, even in the general population, while moral attitudes involve better prefrontal functioning. [...] People with religious beliefs showed a minute increase in both empathy and impulse control, characteristics encouraged by most orthodox religions.”

M. Spinella and O. Wain, Skeptical Inquirer (2006)₂

It is not only chronic neurological dysfunction that can cause religious and supernatural beliefs. Some of the founding experiences can be based on single neurological events such as isolated strokes or seizues. Many types of fit do not involve the motor area of the brain, so do not result in obvious, physical signs of fitting. They can be purely sensory in nature, involving sights, sounds and feelings that range from subtle through to overwhelming.

“Partial seizures can [...] cause clonic movement of part of a limb [, ... or] may trigger an abnormal sensation, or aura, such as an odd smell or sparkling lights. Most bizarre are the partial seizures that elicit more well-formed auras such as dιjα vu (the feeling that something has happened before) or hallucinations.”

"Neuroscience" by Bear, Connors and Paradiso (1996)₅

William James remained convinced that St. Paul was converted to Christianity by a vision that was the result of a lone seizure.

Experiencing God

My page on The Causes of Experiences of God examines many of the psychological factors that lead people to 'experience' the presence of various Gods, and the conclusions read:

1. The psychological wish for an ever-present loving parent looking over us, combined with our ability for abstract ideas to become the basis for our emotions, especially love, form the concept of God as a subconscious parent-substitute and ideal carer. The childhood memory of our seemingly all-knowing and all-capable parents, whom we continuously miss in adult life, causes some people to desire a parental god to exist.

2. Pride and ego incline us toward god-belief: It is more prideful to think that the creator of the billions of galaxies cares deeply about oneself, and it is a function of the ego that we want such an all-powerful eternal being to be watching and judging us. The opposite: That no-one is watching, and no-one keeps measure of our actions, is cold in comparison, so that some peoples' ego's and pride wish for there to be a god.

3. As we can see from the different ways people experience the same event, peoples' expectations influence their reality. Examples of this include, as discussed, sleep apnea: Experienced by some as UFO abductions, and others as attempted demon possession. Of all the experiences and messages given by God, many contradict each other. From this mess of contradictory experiences, combined with the lack of any logical reason why gods would exist, I conclude that there is no God. There are human beings, our wishes, our projections and our experiences led by our own abstractions and expectations, but there is no objective, real God external to the self.

4. That we can stimulate parts of the brain and induce mystical and spiritual experiences in people means that such experiences are explained by the neurological sciences whether or not there is actually a 'spiritual realm'.

5. The burden of proof remains firmly with the spiritualists: Experience of these types of mystical events is not proof of the reality of them, therefore different (logical or experimental) proof needs to be found. Until such proof arrives, it is not sensible to believe in god.

"The Causes of Experiences of God" by Vexen Crabtree

Subconscious Childhood Fantasies

William James (1902) delivered a series of lectures on religion in 1901-02, and two of these were devoted to tracing the psychology of 'conversion' into a religion. He introduces Dr Starbuck:

“Conversion is in its essence a normal adolescent phenomenon, incidental to the passage from the child's small universe to the wider intellectual and spiritual life of maturity. [...] In his recent work on the Psychology of Religion, Professor Starbuck of California [says] "Theology takes the adolescent tendencies and builds upon them; it sees that the essential thing in adolescent growth is bringing the person out of childhood into the new life of maturity and personal insight.”

"The Varieties of Religious Experience" by William James, p203

This compares well with the notes of many psychologists on god and religion, including Sigmund Freud. That religious feelings, and adult ideas about religion, are actually childhood fantasies in disguise. This is not directly what Dr Starbuck and William James were implying, but it is true that many aspects of religion are drawn-out ideas of childhood such as the idea of an ever-present all-loving parent, the feeling of guilt when no-one is looking, the lack of death, etc. In the Christian Bible, in the first letter of St Paul to Corinth, Paul says "when I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me"_{1 Corinthians 13:11}. Although this may be the conscious and intellectualized testimony, religion is largely the subconscious survival of childhood fantasy into adulthood. Childish seeming ideas may have been tidied away into the closet, but from the dark corners of the mind they continue to exert much pressure on the religious mind. Giving childish ideas adult terminology no longer hides the route of wishful thinking from psychologists.

The Fear of Death

“It is not rational arguments, but emotions, that cause belief in a future life. The most important of these emotions is fear of death.”

"Why I am not a Christian" by Bertrand Russell₃

Child psychologists say that 'there is no death' in the world of most childen. Others in history, such as Freud, have explained that "dealing" with the learned idea of death is one of the greatest challenges of adulthood. Many, of course, "deal" with it by imagining that death is not real. That, in fact, we somehow survive death, despite that the self is the brain, and the brain dies.

Professional sociologists and anthropologists have often wondered what causes religion, and what psychological purpose it serves. Many have also noted that the fear of death provides a reason for various religious beliefs:

“Later functionalists included the anthropologist, Bronishaw Malinowski (1884-1942). In his principal book, Magic, Science and Religion and Other Essays (1948), he wrote that social phenomenon such as religion fulfill a function in relation to human psychological needs. In the case of religion, this function is to provide psychological safeguards against the fear of death and thus give human beings the feeling of mastery over their fate.”

"The Phenomenon Of Religion" by M. Momen [Book Review], p54

Equally noted, the astute mind of Einstein also discerned in religion a response to fear of death. Einstein wrote in 1930 that "with primitive man it is above all fear that evokes religious notions - fear of hunger, wild beasts, sickness, death"₄.

The Relation of Desperate Times to New Religious Experiments Including Conversion, Superstitions and Lucky Charms

If you pick cards randomly from a pack (perhaps, the lower value of the card, the less likely we are to win the game), when we pick a low card it is likely to be followed by a higher card. When we pick a few low cards in a row, we are equally likely to pick a higher card next time. If, when we have picked a series of low cards, we perform some action (such as putting on a hat), we can mistakenly attribute the ending of the losing streak to the fact that we just put on a hat. On average, things return to the normal, and with a series of results this is called the regression to average. What does all this have with superstition, beliefs and religion? The social psychologist David Myers explains that "when things reach a low point, we will try anything, and whatever we try - going to a psychotherapist, starting a new diet-exercise plan, reading a self-help book - is more likely to be followed by improvement than by further deterioration"₆, and this statistical naοvety often leads people into thinking some supernatural 'luck' or religious 'reward' has taken place. This explains why a conversion to a new religion when done at a low point in one's life, often leads to an improvement. The same with making sacrifices to a new god, or praying harder than normal; if done during desperate times (such as during drought, alcoholism or financial ruin), the chances are things will get better simply because the law of regression takes effect, but in practice many would mistakenly attribute their reversed fortunes to their new supernatural affiliation.

This would explain why many cults and religions prey on the weak, depressed, down-and-outs and those who have recently experienced catastrophe.. It is amongst these people that they find recruits are most likely to attribute their recovery to the religion, and therefore such people tend to cling to their new religion harder than others who would be tempted to judge the religion on more openly rational grounds.

Conclusions

Religions arise as collections of popular beliefs, codified and institutionalized by the progression of Human organisation. Eventually, the changing beliefs of the masses out-evolve the more dogmatic, established religions. The causes of the religious beliefs of Humankind are rooted in our psychology. Psychologists, sociologists, ethnographers and scientists tend to view religious beliefs as the result of mostly normal psychological systems being applied in the wrong context. A prime example is the way we get angry with cars and computers, and shout insults at them, or the way we tend to see patterns in random behaviour such as brownian motion (our 'hyperactive agent detection device'). Historical investigators such as William James have found that outstanding religious innovaters and leaders have frequently been psychotic, suffered from various mental problems and nervous instability. Experiments on the Human brain have allowed us to discover many of the specific neuronal networks that can misfire to cause us to have 'religious' feelings and experiences. Childhood fantasies, including an absence of death and the seemingly all-present, ever-caring and all-knowing parental figures who give us comfort, often become the basis for religious beliefs in adults. This hidden wishful-thinking mechanism feeds our ego (that someone cares about everything we do) and gives us consolation from death in the idea of an afterlife. Many strange things we 'experience' are cultural (therefore an aspect of upbringing), and once a scientific and critical understanding of them is attained, the beauty of the natural world displaces the appeal of the supernatural. Religion is self-inflicted delusion, illusion, smoke and mirrors.